Well, this is my story, a long story.  

It all started on June 2002. I had started a new job at a company in October 2001, and I quickly started feeling extremely tired and I was experiencing headache all day long.  I should probably mention that I am a medicinal chemist, therefore working with chemicals in laboratories all day. I started noticing I was having trouble performing at my normal level at work. Concentration was very difficult, and I felt like I was living in a fog.
I had problems remembering things. It seemed like I was going around like a zombie.  I soon
started losing sleep and appetite and I felt dizzy most of the time. I went to the doctor and very
quickly I was diagnosed with depression. I sure felt very depressed and I did not fully understand
what was going on. I just felt horrible. My body felt like I was being run over by a truck every day.

I was removed from work for 3 weeks and quickly recovered at the exception of concentration and
memory problems but I did not feel ‘foggy’ anymore.

I was sent to a psychotherapist who quickly noticed that my problems were more on a neurological side.  I had memory problems. I saw a neurologist because I had experienced blackouts at time.  Anyway, my MRI and EEG were performed while I was away from work, therefore, everything showed normal.

I returned to work after 3 weeks and kind of stabilized there for a while.

It was still having difficulty to concentrate and remember but I adjusted to my loss of alertness and loss of intellectual ability.
I still managed to be successful at work but I knew I was fighting something and I was getting scared.

I was expected to perform at a Ph.D. level and I found it more and more difficult to do my work.

My doctor told me that stress and depression can create the problems I was experiencing. At this
point, I was very confused and angry because there was nothing stressful about my job and no
real challenge. The job assignment was so much easier than what I had been trained for and it
just made no sense. I also loved my job and the research activity.  I was soon assigned some new
responsibility.  I became involved in the inventory of 7000 chemicals and I was working on placing
chemicals in vented cabinets in order to increase safety.  Much later, we found that these cabinets
were not vented properly but it was still better than not vented at all.  

I soon started to feel dizzy and nauseous all the time, while at work.

I complained about stomach pain, kidneys pain. I had ultrasound, nothing wrong. I had that ‘drunk-like’ feeling at the end of the day and knew that I was dangerous on the road every night, driving back home. Things got worse very fast after that. I became light sensitive and ask the lab manager to disconnect the bulb above my desk and above my lab space. I had my eyes checked, because my eyes were always burning me. I was nauseous all the time. My sore throat was getting worse. I had a 2 year history of irritated throat and I was getting cold all the time. My mom was very worried. She said I was never sick growing up and something was wrong. I could not have all this health problems suddenly when my family background is a healthy one.  I started worried that I could not get pregnant, none of my former co-workers could either and no-one in my company had carried a pregnancy till the end in the 3 years I was there.

I was also smelling all types of smells even when outside the labs.

I was usually the only one or the first one to notice these smells in office areas. I was wondering if I was not becoming crazy. 
Noises started to get me irritated to a point of rage. I just could not stand it. The phone ring was
just a nightmare. My boyfriend started to complain that he did not want to be home when I was
returning from work. I just felt angry, irritated for no reason. I would come down after a few hours.
My all nervous system felt like it was out in the open.

In December 2003, I noticed my legs were getting tired. 

Of course I was told that was from standing all day and I needed better shoes. I changed shoes, decrease my exercising activity, even considered changing my car to an automatic. I still felt more and more pain in my legs and ankles. I felt burning in my thigh muscle. It almost felt like my muscles were always working even at rest. I felt they were being torn apart. I had to stop exercising completely. It was hard enough to walk. I noticed that I was losing sensation in my feet. Also I felt tingling all the time and numbness sometimes. 


I started recording my symptoms every day on January 2004.

It did not take long to find a pattern. I was better on the weekend.  During the week, the pain was worse in the afternoon and was unbearable on Fridays. I could not go up some stairs.  I went to my
company doctor but I could only see the nurse. I had to fight to get an appointment with him and
he just listened and took notes. I was sent back to my job.  The doctor came to the company
building and I could never get a hold of him after that. During the same time, a co-worker was
suffering from asthma only when in the lab. She quickly was removed from the lab as well and
was forced to quit. 

I went to HR and filed an accident report.

For some strange reasons, the accident report was modified and I got back a different story from workers compensation insurance. HR has told that I had recovered and had returned to my regular occupation. At that time I was restricted from the lab (April 2004). My symptoms improved somewhat but I was suffocating in the new office area I was transferred to. Later on, air quality tests revealed that there was high level of carbon monoxide.  These results were never made public and the company repeated the air quality test.

Some co-workers found some detectors off while testing.

Things went out of control pretty fast and chemists went on strike and refused to enter the lab. A few co-workers started gathering safety information. 2 laboratories were shut down. There was a tear in a ventilation duct.  I have found proof that the tear was present since June 2001 and that it would have required to shut down the labs for 2 months for repairs. The Vice President decided not to do so. The safety officer was also forced to quit in December 2003 because she had found that the labs were unsafe. She wanted to shut some labs down and was forced to leave as a consequence.

These are only a few things of what I had been able to collect.

I have collected a lot of evidence that there were serious health hazard at my company.  The parent company shut down the site shortly after they found out about the safety issues.

I have been laid off like everybody else.

I was on disability at the time of lay off, but my company had never sent out the doctor notes to the insurance company. They hide the fact that I was disabled.

I now have 2 specialists diagnosis, with a reasonable degree of certainty, that I have suffered from toxic encephalopathy and toxic neuropathy, my symptoms have resolved after removal from the lab and I am now left with multiple chemical sensitivity.

My doctor has of course terminated my career for medical reason. I can never go back into research. I graduated with a Ph.D. 4 years ago and have to give up my career so early. I would now be happy if I could only find a job, any job, where I would not be feeling sick. I can’t spend much time outside the house without getting sick from various smells.

My husband and I will soon put our house on the market.

We can’t afford it. It will be hard to find a job that meets all my requirements (basically working from home).

My lawyer was very interested in the case back in August.

He is now saying that I have no case because there is no solid medical evidence. All my tests were done 2 to 3 months after removal from the laboratory. The occupational health doctor had refused to see me and/or recommend me to others doctors. It took me 2 months to get to a specialist and another month to get some test done.

Even though, the tests have picked up some concentration problems and some loss of sensation in my feet, it does not seem to be enough for a case.

I do not understand that I can not even be compensated for my disability.

My disability insurance does not cover work related injury. So on one hand, I am recognized as a work injured person and on the other hand (workers compensation) I don’t have a case because of lack of medical evidence. 2 opinions of 2 specialist of solvent exposure, is not enough. Without mentioning all the evidence of lack of safety in my laboratory.

It seems very unfair.

All employees are willing to testify. There are tons of proofs that the labs were unsafe, the hoods were functioning at only 60% but certified at 100%, that the HVAC system was failing all the time etc…Lots of chemists were suffering from migraines, dizziness and concentration problem.

Only 2 chemists were extremely injured. It is not surprising that we were among the most productive chemists, therefore spending more time in the lab, and we were both located next to a 30 gallons drums of chemical waste, open to the atmosphere, in 2 labs that had fluctuating temperatures (mostly high temperatures above the boiling point of the solvent).

So I don’t have a lawyer who is willing to represent me.

I feel like he has not even look at all the documentation I had given him. The best scenario is that I might get long term disability for a year but right now, I am paying him, and have not seen any results.

I am in financial difficulty.

I wish I could return to my career. I loved my job and I miss doing research. Most of all, I wish I could get out of the house and have a normal life again.


I am allergic to cigarette smokes, perfumes, car exhaust, non organic food, cleaning solution, nail polish, rubbing alcohol, markers, paint odors, etc.. everything based on chemicals.

I can’t go to restaurant, movie theatres, most public places etc.. I can’t have a drop of alcohol (solvent by chemical definition). My life has been ruined.

I can’t get recognized as sick.

Now that I can walk again, so the only way to get a medical proof is to re-expose me to hexane and dichloromethane while monitoring my legs (EMG). But no doctors will ever do that. 

I don’t know that I can get another job, unless it is from my house.

We are going to lose the house and there is nothing I can do.

I need some legal help.

My life has been destroyed and I can’t stop thinking about the VP telling us that he had already lost 600 medicinal chemists that year and could not afford to shut 2 labs down for repairs. It is criminal and he even agreed to the fact that they knew and could not do anything due to financial reason. It makes me angry and nauseous.

The building is back on the market for rent to another pharmaceutical company.

The problem has not been fixed and can not be fixed. The building is not designed to accommodate so many hoods and chemistry labs. It was designed for office space. More people will suffer and get sick. More chemists’ life would be ruined.  And there is nothing I can do about it. 

So this is my story.

I don’t understand why I don’t have a case. It makes no sense to me or to other co-workers, friends and family members who have watched me getting sicker and sicker and who know about all the things that were hidden at my company. It really seems like the lawyer is just not willing to put the effort into it. I am running out of money now, so I can’t afford another lawyer. 

I have lost trust in the system.

I can’t even hope for what is only fair. I am disgusted and angry. I guess I will get used to it like most of us. I now need to focus on surviving and can not waste energy on anger.  Chances are that I will be denied my green card for lack of finance and will be forced to return to my country where I will also not qualify for any monetary assistance. So I have to take it one step at a time and wait for the next loss.

 

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